UNE campus, 1950s

The two photos below were taken by my father in the late 1950s – probably about 1957. They are scans of 35 mm Kodachrome transparencies.

It felt very much like a university in those days. Students wore undergraduate gowns to all lectures and tutorials, except for laboratory classes. Classes were small, senior staff took tutorials as well as giving lectures, and staff and students knew each other. The university was fully residential, and in the colleges that were built from 1956 on we dined formally four nights a week, again in academic dress, with the Master and Fellows processing in and taking their places on the high table. The university had become autonomous in 1954 and was making its own independent way. There was a lot of optimism about its future, a feeling that staff and students were building something worthwhile.

The image below was taken in the forecourt on the northern side of Booloominbah. It must be third term, with the annual exams approaching. Of the beautiful grounds around Booloominbah it used to be said in relation to exam time, “When the wisteria starts to bloom it is time to make your run; when the roses bloom it is too late”.

This second image shows students passing through the main gate of Booloominbah in the direction of the Booth Block, the first permanent building to be added to the estate donated by the White family. Named after Edgar Booth, the first Warden of the New England University College, it served initially as the Science Block. In my time there in the early 1960s it was mainly mathematics and, from 1964, the first computer centre, in the days when computers were mainframes and there was one to serve all of the university’s research and administrative needs.

Border protection under Tony Abbott

Guest post by Tony Kevin

We will see under the Abbott Government a tougher philosophy and administration of Australia's policing of its northern maritime borders against unauthorised boat people. It cannot be assumed numbers of arrivals will quickly fall to zero, though they are already trending downwards since Kevin Rudd announced in July that all irregular maritime arrivals will be processed in PNG or Nauru and resettled offshore.

The Coalition pledged during the campaign to maintain that policy, and to augment it with new tough measures of deterrence at the borders.

In our northern maritime approaches, the new Government faces three policy challenges: to maintain maritime border protection and rescue-at-sea systems that are transparent and publicly accountable; to restore clarity to an Australian maritime rescue response system whose understanding of its responsibilities has been clouded by the pressures of the past four years; and to try to turn boats back to Indonesia without loss of life at sea.

There has been some public discussion of the third challenge, which is essentially operational. But the first and second are even more important, because they go to the heart of Australian values as a successful multicultural country of immigration that respects human rights.

One of Labor's humanitarian achievements was to establish a system of routine media releases announcing every boat interception and every incident of assistance to boats in difficulty at sea. The public thus had access to reasonably prompt and accurate numbers of arrivals and deaths at sea. Major fatal incidents at sea were reported in ministerial media briefings. They have been subject to routine internal Customs and Border Protection departmental reviews. There have, commendably, been four public coronial inquests.

It would be tragic if under Operation Sovereign Borders, as foreshadowed by Scott Morrison, the present degree of public transparency and accountability for deaths in border protection operations were to be abandoned on the spurious pretext (as happened under Operation Relex in 2001) that these are matters of national security that cannot be disclosed. It was a lesson from Operation Relex that any attempt to hide border security operations in which unacceptable risks were taken with human life, or in which deaths at sea occurred, will inevitably leak out. A civilised country should not fear submitting its border protection practices and outcomes to regular public reporting.

The second challenge is equally important. In the last four years, while up to 50,000 boat people have safely reached Australia, around 1100 people have died at sea in 30 known incidents. Many of those deaths were preventable, had Australian rescue-at-sea responses to observed or reported distress-at-sea situations been more prompt and diligent, in accordance with our Rescue at Sea Convention obligations and decent maritime practice.

Australia's rescue-at-sea values became degraded since 2009 under pressure of increasing numbers of boat people, as they were degraded during Operation Relex. In recent years, the Australian Maritime Safety Authority came to see asylum seekers venturing out in unseaworthy boats as people who exploited an international rescue-at-sea system designed for 'genuine' mariners in distress.

Even now, despite significant criticism from the Perth Coroner of response shortcomings in the most recent inquest (SIEV 358), this agency has not conceded that its role is to coordinate prompt rescue of every mariner in distress. It still acts at times as if it were a border protection policeman. The agency has become desensitised to asylum seeker deaths at sea. This must change.

On turnbacks or towbacks, the risks of deaths at sea are well known to the ADF from its 2001 experience. As the Navy understands, protecting human life at sea must always come first. Possibly, a firm but humane administration of attempted turnback operations will prevent deaths of people who are under desperate stress but are not at war with Australia.

ADF ships' commanders must never be given reckless operating instructions or be micro-managed from shore, as happened in 2001 with SIEV 4, the 'children overboard' boat. They must know that their careers will not be blighted if they put their safety-of-life-at sea obligations first in any attempted turnback situations, even at the cost of some annoyance or embarrassment to ministers. And the ADF high command must back them.

Tony Kevin served as an Australian diplomat for 30 years 1968-98, serving in posts including the Soviet Union, UN New York, and lastly as ambassador in Poland and Cambodia. His most recent book is Reluctant Rescuers (2012). His previous publication on refugee boat tragedy — A Certain Maritime Incident — was the recipient of a NSW Premier's literary award in 2005.

The original of this article was published in Eureka Street on 10 September 2013. It may be viewed at Border protection transparency under Abbott.

Open letter to the Prime Minister-elect

Below is the text of an open letter to the Prime Minister-elect, the Hon. Tony Abbott MP, signed by me and a number of distinguished Australians who support the cause of our Campaign for an Iraq War Inquiry, was published in today’s edition of The Age. The original may be viewed online at An open letter on war to the new PM.

BEGINS

Among the many big-picture items missing from Australia's recent election campaign was foreign policy. While Australians were voting, the United States President was seeking US congressional and international approval to launch a punitive military action against the government of Syria, which would almost certainly bring further suffering and disruption to populations in the region.

We welcomed the news that the US would hold off on a military strike because Syria has ''already agreed'' to an initiative by Russia for Damascus to hand over its chemical weapons stocks to international control. However, the danger of another disastrous military intervention persists.

The newly elected Australian government may soon have to decide whether, how and under what circumstances we would support our major ally in another armed intervention in the Middle East.

Ten years ago Australia strongly supported the US invasion of Iraq on the decision of the prime minister. We believe that on this occasion Australia should independently assess how best we can serve the interests of the people of Syria and broader international security interests.

There is a related, fundamentally important issue that will apply not only now in relation to Syria but every time the possibility of Australian support or involvement in military action is considered. How and by whom should a decision to send Australian troops to war be made - by the prime minister or by a broader consultative process?

We invite prime minister-elect Tony Abbott to tell the Australian people whether he believes that a prime minister should continue to have the authority to take Australia into international armed conflict on her/his own, or whether he would support a bill requiring parliamentary debate and approval before the Australian Defence Force is deployed overseas in combat.

Specifically, in relation to concerns about weapons of mass destruction, does he believe Australia should defer to the established international channels for WMD verification, monitoring and compliance?

The importance of these issues is stark. There has been no policy review of the decision made by Australia's leadership in 2003 to invade Iraq, and no inquiry into the decision-making process to draw out lessons or make recommendations for the future.

We appear now to be at risk of repeating the errors of 2003. Before the election, the Rudd government made supportive comments about US plans for a military strike against Syria, despite the absence of a report from UN weapons inspectors, and in the absence of authorisation from the UN Security Council. While Coalition comments at the time appeared to be commendably more cautious, a commitment to a proper and transparent decision-making process is lacking.

At the same time, the British Parliament has considered and rejected Prime Minister David Cameron's bid for British involvement, President Barack Obama has decided to turn to Congress to seek wider political endorsement of his planned military strike, and French President Francois Hollande has also decided to consult his parliament.

At the recent G20 summit, a majority of participating governments did not support the case for US military action in Syria without an authorising UN Security Council resolution. The situation in Britain demonstrates the valuable role of legislatures in acting as a brake on the impulsive use of executive power.

Australia's policy is particularly crucial during our current term on the UN Security Council, and our presidency of the council this month. The responsibility to respect and protect the pre-eminent role of the United Nations in examining the evidence and all possible responses to security threats and violations, weighs heavily on us.

International law states that no military action is legal unless authorised by the Security Council or in a country's own self-defence. While the crisis in Syria demands an international response, military intervention would be the most risky, destructive and costly option, and one that would make a terrible situation worse.

We urge that the lessons of 2003 be heeded, and that Australia follow the lead of the majority of our allies and major regional partners in withholding support for the course of action now being proposed by President Obama.

We also urge that parliamentary debate and approval become standard before the Australian Defence Force is deployed overseas in combat. If Parliament cannot be persuaded that Australia should be at war, then the case for authorising it is not sufficiently strong. If MHRs and senators are required to debate and vote on a case for war, they will be individually and collectively responsible for Australia's decision.

Deploying the Australian Defence Force into international armed conflict is the gravest decision a government can make. This is not a decision for a leader acting alone, nor for a leader in concert with a small group of cabinet colleagues. Australians have the right to expect that such a decision would receive the most rigorous scrutiny of all possible consequences, including humanitarian, military, legal, strategic and political, by all those elected to represent us.

This article is signed by:

Paul Barratt AO, former secretary, Department of Defence

John Menadue AO, former secretary, Department of Prime Minister and Cabinet

Malcolm Fraser, former Liberal prime minister

Professor Ian Maddocks AM, Senior Australian of the Year

Professor Peter Baume AC, former federal Liberal minister

Garry Woodard, retired ambassador

Professor Ramesh Thakur, former UN assistant secretary-general

Elizabeth Evatt AC, former judge

Kellie Merritt, widow of Flight Lieutenant Paul Pardoel, who was killed in Iraq

On politics and strategy

Listening to ABC Radio National presenter Geraldine Doogue talking to a couple of pundits about electoral matters this morning set me once again to thinking about the role of strategy in the conduct of politics. There was talk about how the ALP didn’t explain its achievements well enough, and questions about what it stood for – is there any position that Kevin Rudd wouldn’t change in order to cling to power?

Good questions, but the fact that they arise is inextricably linked to the lack of a strategy and to the lack of a basis for formulating a strategy.

First, it is important to get clear the distinction between “strategy” and “tactics”. The Concise Oxford Dictionary informs us that these are military terms. Strategy is “the art of war” and refers in particular to imposing upon the enemy “the place and time and conditions for fighting preferred by oneself”. Tactics relates to the “skilful devices” used by those forces that are in actual contact with the enemy.

The Battle of the Atlantic was deeply strategic because on the one hand Britain aimed to enhance its capacity to wage war by accessing the industrial might and food production capacity of the United States; Germany aimed to make it impossible for Britain to continue to wage war, by cutting off the necessary trans-Atlantic supply lines. How submarines attacked convoys to maximise the Allied losses whilst minimising the losses to themselves is a tactical level issue, and so is the way in which the convoy escort vessels responded to a submarine attack.

To cast the matter in non-military terms, tactics is the art of responding as effectively as possible to the world as you find it; strategy is the art of reshaping or influencing to your advantage the environment in which you are working.

And so to the link between political parties “standing for something”, explaining their policies and their achievements effectively, and political strategy. I would argue that standing for something is the central issue here, because it both enables and forces a political party to think at a strategic level, and it enables the party, having done so, to explain the value of what it has done and what it is setting out to do, because it sets the party on the road to changing in its favour the way people think about the issues. It can give meaning to its achievements, it can put them in a larger context, and it can make them part of a larger whole.

Paul Keating was able to win the 1993 election, which was supposed to be unwinnable for him, because he was operating on the basis of beliefs he brought into politics and which he refined his views about over the course of the preceding twenty years in Parliament.  Love him or hate him, Keating stood for something – for many things, for a view about Australian society and Australia’s place in the world – and I would guess that even his detractors would allow that there were things that Keating would never contemplate doing in order to win or retain office.

Accordingly, Keating was able to campaign not only passionately but with devastating effectiveness because he was campaigning on his chosen ground, on matters he believed in, which gave him the advantage that he not only sounded as though he meant it, he had all the detail internalised and could muster the necessary lines of argument without faltering. Keating always sounded authentic.

In the election campaign just drawing to its dreary conclusion, Kevin Rudd has been attempting to market to us policies that have been dreamt up on the campaign trail, policies which were injected into the political market place not because he believed in them, but because he thought we might buy them. Accordingly, the quality of the policies and the quality of the arguments adduced to support them has been laughable.   

It will probably be apparent that closely aligned to the issue of “standing for something” is the issue of “trust”. If people believe a politician stands for something and he/she campaigns on the basis of policies that align with that world view, people will take their policy proposals seriously and will make their decisions on the basis that what is being proposed is what you will get if they are voted into office. Once trust is lost, people stop listening because what is being said is not conveying information that can be used as a basis for decision making – it doesn’t matter what this person says, how would you know what they will actually do?

This was a particular problem for Kevin Rudd because he had made so many 180 degree turns. After characterising climate change as the greatest moral challenge of our generation he effectively abandoned it as soon as the going got rough; similarly with the Henry Tax Review and mineral resource rent taxation, and his policy shift in relation to asylums seekers – from relative humanity to outright brutality – was extraordinary. The contrast in his attitudes to Iraq and Syria is striking too. In opposition in 2003 he (quite properly) argued that we should wait until the weapons inspectors had finished their work, and that we should not be taking military action against Iraq in the absence of UN authorisation. Now, on the eve of our becoming President of the UN Security Council and having a particular responsibility to uphold and protect the UN system, he and his Foreign Minister are insisting that we don’t need to wait until the inspectors make their report, and that if the Security Council fails to back a United States attack on Syria then the US should act without UN support because Syria need to be taught a lesson.

I said earlier that “standing for something” forces a political party to think strategically. This is because, having decided that it embodies certain values and stands for a particular view of the world and Australia’s place in it (”the vision thing”), the party is obliged to try to persuade as many as people to see the world their way. In this way it is reshaping the battlefield to its own advantage, and making it much easier to convince people of the virtues of its individual policies. Margaret Thatcher understood that – I heard at the time that she, on a visit to Canberra while the Coalition was flopping about in Opposition, gave them stern counsel: “You should stop reading the opinion polls, decide what you stand for, and convince people to vote for that”.

Against this background it is easy to see why Tony Abbott and the Coalition have had such an immense advantage in this election campaign. They have been operating strategically; Kevin Rudd and Julia Gillard have been operating tactically. Tony Abbott has been framing the debate (see Lenore Taylor on that subject in today’s edition of The Guardian here) while Rudd and Gillard have meekly agreed, over most of the six years of Labor’s missed opportunities in office, to fight on Tony Abbott’s chosen ground.

Thus, although Labor handled the GFC response with great effectiveness, it is so apologetic about running budget deficits that it allowed itself to be manoeuvred into making returning the budget to surplus an overarching objective of policy. Acceptance of this one premise eliminated at a stroke any possibility of the ALP campaigning on the basis that it would offer the start of a major overhaul of the nation’s urban public transport systems, and allowed Tony Abbott to get away with his extraordinary claim that urban public transport was not the Commonwealth’s business (I worked on the Whitlam Government’s urban public transport programs during my time in the Commonwealth Treasury in 1973-74).

Similarly, Labor has allowed the Coalition to frame the debate about asylum seekers in terms of the sole measure of performance being the number of people who arrive here by boat. Labor’s strictly tactical response has been to try find ways to reduce the number of arrivals, an approach which has taken it down the path of trying to outbid the Coalition in a contest to see who could adopt the most brutal policies.

An alternative approach for a party affecting to have progressive values would have been to explain to the Australian public that Australia stands for a more civilised world order, and that as a middle power we need a rules based international system; that we are proud to have been one of the countries that negotiated the Refugee Convention and of being one of the foundation signatories; that people with a well-founded fear of persecution have rights under the Convention and that we respect and uphold those rights; that we are a nation of laws and of due process that will ensure that asylum seekers have proper opportunity to have their claims heard; and that we are a confident, affluent society that is easily able to address this issue.

Neither Kevin Rudd nor Julia Gillard was the architect of this particular manifestation of the Labor malaise. Immigration Minister Gerry Hand steered mandatory detention through Cabinet during the Keating era, and Kim Beazley signed up to John Howard’s approach to the Tampa (a special forces assault on a civilian vessel carrying rescuees!) in 2001. I ranted about this to my rusted on Labor-supporting friends at the time; they patiently explained to me that he had to do that to minimise Labor’s losses in the election campaign. It profited them nothing, and he sold the party’s soul.

This is all part of a general malaise which has afflicted left of centre parties over several decades now. They have allowed themselves to be bullied into accepting without question the weltanschauung of the centre right: “there is no such thing as society” (as Margaret Thatcher famously said); the economy is everything, the rest is just froth and bubble; small government is better than big government; the government shouldn’t build anything or own anything; the market always knows best (“market failure” is just a weak excuse crypto-socialists use to justify intervention on behalf of rent-seekers) and free trade and free investment flows will always deliver the best outcome. And you must never allow anyone to accuse you of being soft on national security.

If they accept that as the terrain on which all political battles must be fought, it is pretty hard to for left of centre parties to present themselves as a better alternative to parties that actually believe all that stuff and are prepared to fight for it.